Cold Nights
by CelestiaTrollworth
Summary: Celestia takes a Heart Warming Eve walk with some youngsters.


No wonder it's Hearth Warming Eve. On these cold nights, when the magic around us does not hold back the ice, when the plants crave their rest and the sun sleeps in, it's hard to remember the turning of the year toward spring. Thin packed snow crunches beneath my hooves, and I know from the haze of breath in the air what it will be like outside town.

The foals chosen to come with me as far as the edge of town are waiting, their parents taking pictures, whispering instructions to be good and fussing with their manes, everyone else milling around after the year's pageant. The palace guards know the drill; they can't come with me. Beyond the edge of town, no one can.

"Are we all ready?" With one more glance around, I start walking, slowly so as not to outrun the little ones bundled up against the chill. My wings are enough, folded around me; the colts and fillies are small and spend so much time indoors that they need their blankets and boots. A block or two beyond the trampled snow, the fresh street creaks beneath our hooves. The little unicorn filly gasps and startles, looking down at her feet. "What's that noise, Princess?" "It's the snow. When it gets this cold, the way it was on the first Hearth Warming, the little grains are hard and they squeak against each other. We always thought it was a lot of fun. No one goes out to play in it much any more."

The pegasus colt with the "Future Wonderbolt" jacket hops up and hovers, looking down at the diamond glitter underfoot, then drops all four feet into it to hear the sound. "Did the earth ponies play when they first came here?"

"After a while, when they could. That first winter no one felt a lot like playing because they were so tired." That's how I'm going to put it: tired. They were, after what they went through; the kids all exchange glances and nod with first-grade wisdom, no doubt remembering how they played the hungry earth ponies in the pageant half an hour ago. They will think they understand, and for now, that's perfectly all right.

"Did you play when you were a filly, Princess?" She's half hidden behind my mane, a little bay pony. I knew her family; they were there in the crowd and helped choose Granny Smith to be their spokesmare when they all came to ask for the land. She looks a little Smith, a little Appleby, and I can see the beginning of the copper shine the Russet side of her family used to have in their coats after the first few years here. No one shone then; their blankets worn thin, their hooves worn, so many lame, so many rough and gaunt with ribs showing, they still stood behind Granny, waiting for my answer. If I said "no", they were perfectly willing to go back down the mountain and keep walking, no matter who dropped by the side of the road, until someone said "yes".

"We surely did. The pegasi are going to have a big snow next week so the winter wheat will get a better start. When it comes, you should bundle up like this and go out to the park, where you won't fall on anything, and run in it."

"Ooh! I suppose we shouldn't run on this."

"Maybe not right here. It's a little slippery because it has this crust. You can stamp it and listen to it and eat the clean parts, though." Only to show them-that's my story and I'm sticking to it-I go over to the side and pick a mouthful from a branch. Everyone giggles as they try it. The pink unicorn tries a little spell to get hers, bops herself in the nose with it, shies for a second and grins.

"Crunchy! I bet it would taste even better with some strawberries. Grandma says the earth ponies ate snow because there was no water when it was so cold." For a moment, I can see her among the unicorns from then, after-No, I won't imagine her like that. She will always be the way she is tonight, her parents' precious firstborn, groomed to perfection and wrapped up in the best warmest coat they could find. She will always be warm and happy. The ancestors ate snow because they were thirsty; she's imagining a day when the water fountain at school broke.

"And they were hungry," says a unicorn girl. "Even in Cloudsdale they were hungry."

"Being hungry would be bad," the pegasus agrees. "I forgot my lunch the other day and I was _starving_ until Applebloom shared hers with me. She always brings extra."

"That's nice of her." It is, but I know Granny will never stop putting extra food in a lunchbox or laying by more supplies than they can use.

There's a field at the edge of town, and I know there's nothing to get hurt on under the snow. I make a careful snowball and fly it over so one of the earth ponies can kick it. The pegasi go up and jump on a tiny cloud, squeezing out a flurry for us. Before long, they are running and sliding, giggling and snorting, unicorns floating walls of snow for earth ponies to jump through. They have the idea, and at the rate he's bringing in the snow Future Wonderbolt might live up to his jacket. It won't be too many years before he'll be flying recon when someone gets lost. The parents have followed in a quiet herd, waiting just off the playing field to walk their offspring home. "I notice how well you all work together."

"Miss Cheerilee says we need to remember how that made Ponyville work," a unicorn says, looking as serious as her baby self can.

"The cold must have been so hard on them." My little bay friend is shivering in spite of herself, maybe because of the cold, maybe because we're almost at the edge of the forest, where the fence and the signs warn about going in at night. "Mom says a lot of foals were very sick."

"Yes, they were." And that's all I can say about it, all I will say about it.

"But they still got here,"says the little bay. "And they...just went right up to your castle, like that?"

"They certainly did! They walked up the hill and asked if they could settle here. Of course I said yes." A shadow overhead gets my attention, if not theirs; there is so little starlight, and no moon, out here at the edge of the streetlights, that they don't notice. A shoulder-height above the ground Luna folds her wings, drops just like the little pegasus did, lands all four feet in the snow with a squeak and gives a little squeal. "I take it you'll walk them all back?"

"Yes!" She nudges her nose through the crunching snow. "It's almost like when we were little." She leans close to my ear. "When they're home, I'll have your back."

"All right." I turn and look around at the obedient, but not quite so neat group. "You all want to learn the song?" All those little heads nod eagerly, because they'll teach the rest of the school. It'll be the first time they lead anything. I'd lay odds that most of them have already memorized the words. "My herd came to the forest, and we walked and we walked..."

They have to have more pictures taken, of course, and I send them off with Luna and the parents. Granny has come out. So has her cousin Green Gage, who is even older. Neither of them can walk that far any more, so they'll ride along on the taxi and tell the stories all the way home while the colts and fillies sing and the ones in the middle think. I stand in the snow, watching them until they're almost out of sight, then flip the gate open and close it behind me. The thin stars show the black branches and nothing more a few feet in.

They walked through here, without wings, without magic. They walked before anyone knew what was here. They kept together, as much as they could, and they kept going because they had no choice. When they made it through the cold and the hunger and the sickness, when they made it through the wolves and the winter, and they walked up to the castle, who was I to tell them they couldn't have the land here? I remember saying "Of course!" and then looking at Green Gage, his ribs sticking out until I could have stuck my muzzle between them, his hooves so worn I could see his tracks up the mountain. "Goodness, what would you have done if I'd said 'no'?"

"We would have kept going until somebody said 'yes'," he said, still standing tall. Never mind wings and magic; I would rather have courage like his.

The path is marked, the way smooth through the woods. A foal can get lost in here, but most adults can manage in the daylight, and even at night I have light and if the distant howling pack came this way it wouldn't take me a second to fly out of their way. It's nothing. I won't get all the way to the castle on the ground tonight; when it gets close to sunrise, I'll have to take wing and go get it, but until then I will walk. I owe it to them.

For now, those colts and fillies know their ancestors were hungry, and they're thinking they skipped lunch. Their ancestors were cold, and they're thinking they know cold now because they walked in the snow with me. Their ancestors were sick, and they're thinking about that time they had a little colic, or the bad cold that was going around last week. It's all they could handle, and I wish they never had to think about more. When they realize the rest of it, they will realize this too: the rest of the words to that song are as true for them as for the ancestors. That kind of heart never goes away through the generations. If they need it, they have it. I'll sing the other verses on my way and end with the best one just for all of the colts and fillies tonight:

My herd walked through this forest not afraid, not afraid

And I walk through this forest not afraid, not afraid

I can do what they have done. I can walk the path they made.

I can do what I must do, and I am brave.


End file.
